


the way the autumn came

by Raven (singlecrow)



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Cotton Candy Fluff, F/F, In a manner of speaking, actually with cotton candy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-12
Updated: 2013-12-12
Packaged: 2018-01-04 10:40:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1080038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/singlecrow/pseuds/Raven
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I hate corn," April tells her, "I hate mazes, I hate corn mazes, I hate trees, I hate cotton candy, I hate parks and I hate recreation."</p>
            </blockquote>





	the way the autumn came

**Author's Note:**

> For thingswithwings - happy birthday, dear.

So the year after Leslie's harvest festival, the one that attracted eighty thousand visitors from across the state and broke, like, a dozen local records and had an appreciable and graphable effect on the local economy, whatever, April doesn't care, a bunch of other small towns start thinking it's something they should be doing. Ben says some stuff about the value to the city of the harvest festival's intellectual property and Leslie says some stuff about upholding a culture of share and share alike and they have one of those weirdly-sexually-charged fights about government assets and the upshot is Leslie sending both of them, April and Ben, to places like Muncie and Carmel and Bumfuck, Indiana, to talk about how they can run harvest festivals of their own. (Although, the Pawnee Harvest Festival is the only one that's allowed to be called that, the others are called things like "Autumn Celebration" and "Big Ol' Shindig" and "Only Seventeen People Live Here, Who The Hell Cares". April wouldn't know any of this stuff anyway if Ben and Leslie hadn't been yelling loud enough to be heard three hundred miles away in Port Sunlight, IN, pop. 34, and a dog, which is coincidentally where they end up in late afternoon of day one, waving their hands around and yelling about cost-benefit analysis, which really means, renting a rollercoaster is stupid if everyone in town can go for a ride at once.)

Anyway, so it takes two days of driving around the state and April thinks it's going to be shitty and boring but somehow it's okay: they eat a lot of bad food and meet a lot of people who want to talk to them about corn and the radio flickers between country and Christian rock and they don't talk that much in the car, but it's not awkward. It's okay. April takes the last share of the driving and they come back into Pawnee pretty late at night, and Ben half-wakes up for a second and says, "You know, I never cared about much before, either" – and she has no idea what he's talking about, but he's falling asleep again and they're home and they don't have to talk about corn mazes any more so, whatever.

She goes into the Parks Department the morning after and it's a crisp fall day, kind of nice, and Andy's dealing with someone on the permits desk and April's looking at her list of campaign stuff to do and how it's gotten super-long since she's been away, when Leslie comes in and says, delightedly, "April! You're back!" 

Leslie has fallen leaves stuck to her boots, and more in her hair, and when April was walking in earlier she saw the drifts the city leaf blowers had left piled up against the walls of City Hall, and April sort of figures that one of those nice neat piles isn't so neat any more. "We finished up early," she mumbles, talking to the floor, and Leslie gives her a hug and twirls her a little.

"I'll get you some coffee," she says, and April takes it black, but she's getting it with cream and sugar whether she says so or not, so she keeps her mouth shut and Leslie goes out.

"What did you and Ben talk about for two days?" Andy's wondering out loud, which was the conversation they were having before Leslie came in, and Donna laughs in this weird, knowing way, which April does not get, at all, and god, she's busy, she doesn't have time for this, she has to make a recommendation for Leslie about how to allocate the Sweetums funds for the animal shelter and she has to go make some canvassing calls and first she has to leave government property if she's doing that, so she's gonna have to do that in her lunch, and she wishes Andy would stop talking and Donna would stop laughing and they would all go away and leave her alone. It's so loud in here.

"Hey," Andy says, picking something off the counter, "Leslie forgot her hat."

April stares at the hat. It's red and woolly and has a bobble and a snowflake pattern. It's so cheerful it makes her sick, and just like that she makes a decision. "Give it to me," she orders, and Andy kind of blinks, but he hands it over.

April ducks in the hallway to avoid Chris and round another corner to avoid Ann and then she's outside, out in the fresh, sparkling fall air, under the leaves swirling down from the highest branches, and Leslie's there, looking surprised to see her, her hands full of coffee cups and her hair bright and flyaway under the sun.

"I hate corn," April tells her, gesturing emphatically, "I hate mazes, I hate corn mazes, I hate eating Taco Bell three meals in a row, I hate trees and I hate cotton candy and I hate parks and recreation" – and she picks a stray leaf out of Leslie's hair, like she's been wanting to do since the second she saw Leslie walk in to the Parks Department, and steps in, and kisses her.

"Whoa," Leslie says, moving back. "April, are you – do you…" She stops. "Are you okay?"

"I don't know," April says, "I really do hate parks."

"You don't mean that," Leslie says, and laughs, softly, and April makes a kind of involuntary frustrated noise.

"I do," she says. "I hate most stuff. I hate doing stuff. But, you" – she pauses, thinks about that - "I don't hate you. I don't like it," she adds, covering her face with her hands. 

"Thank you," Leslie says. "I think? April, are you okay? Is Andy…"

"Andy," April says, kind of stupidly, because maybe this _is_ stupid, but this is nothing to do with stupid Andy, stupid wonderful Andy who would understand that sometimes you have to do the things that feel right inside your body, like music, and nothing to do with Ben, either, stupid Ben who broke up with Leslie and has no right to wake up under the glare of a passing streetlamp and say stupid true stuff. "Leslie, can I…"

Leslie puts the coffee cups down on the ground in front of her and stands still. "Yeah?"

"Can I kiss you again?" April asks, and of course, Leslie would wait for the end of the sentence: Leslie wouldn't assume. But she's nodding and April takes another step forwards and experimentally pushes her hands through Leslie's hair. This time it's a proper kiss, not passionate, but exploratory and confident, laced with the promise of something. Leslie mostly tastes of sugar, and dark roast grounds, and something else which is probably determination, or maybe toothpaste. They draw apart and look at each other for a moment, breathing hard in the freezing air.

After a minute they both giggle, like you do when you stare at someone for too long, and April says, like it's deep and profound, "You forgot your hat." 

"Oh," Leslie says, and holds out her hand for it, but April doesn't let go. She puts it back on Leslie's head herself, and Leslie holds still to let her do that and they're both tentative in their movements, but that could just be the cold. 

"I take my coffee black," she says, pulling Leslie onwards.

"Okay," Leslie says. "Okay." 

And it is really is cold right now, so April takes Leslie's hand with fresh resolve and they set off back towards City Hall, to the thousand things they have to do today, and all the work after that, stretching out ahead. April's kicking leaves up so maybe they'll land in Leslie's hair and she'll get to pick them out again. Or maybe she won't: they can't kiss inside government buildings. They'll just have to carry outside wherever they go.


End file.
